State by State: Northeast

Published: November 7, 2000

(Page 4 of 4)

Mr. Chafee drew Democrats who defected from his opponent, Representative Robert Weygand, after a primary race in which Mr. Weygand alienated abortion rights advocates, environmentalists and party loyalists who blamed him for cooperating with the federal authorities in a local political-corruption scandal. But the voters replaced Mr. Weygand in the House with another Democrat, Mr. Langevin, the hugely popular secretary of state. On Tuesday, Mr. Langevin's strongest opponent was an independent candidate. Only 14 percent of the vote went to the Republican, Robert Tingle, a pit manager at the Foxwoods casino in Connecticut.

VERMONT

Al Gore easily won Vermont, but Ralph Nader, the Green Party candidate, garnered 7 percent of the vote in this traditionally liberal state.

In an unusually bitter campaign year, state races were dominated by the newly enacted law granting civil unions for gay couples with virtually all the rights of marriage.

The Vermont voters sent a decidedly mixed message about the law that brought them national attention this year. They re-elected the Democratic governor who signed the bill into law but gave Republicans a new majority in the state House for the first time in 14 years.

Gov. Howard Dean, the Democrat, won a hard-fought campaign for a sixth term, defeating Ruth Dwyer, a Republican farmer strongly opposed to the civil unions, and a third-party candidate.

Republicans took control of the state House, winning by appealing to what analysts called a backlash against civil unions. Democrats, however, extended their control of the state Senate.

In his victory speech, Governor Dean vowed to bring back a tone of civility and tolerance to the political debate and put aside the acrimony of the campaign.

Otherwise, voters re-elected familiar, moderate incumbents to represent them in Washington. Senator James M. Jeffords, a Republican, won a third term defeating Ed Flanagan, the state auditor and an openly gay candidate. Bernard Sanders, the independent who calls himself a socialist, won a sixth term as Vermont's only representative in the House.

WEST VIRGINIA

West Virginia has voted for Republican presidential candidates only three times in the last half century, all of them incumbents. But on Tuesday, Gov. George W. Bush took the state's five electoral votes.

Several factors appeared to have hurt Vice President Al Gore: fears among coal miners and others in the coal industry that his environmental policies could wreak havoc with jobs, and fears among gun owners that Mr. Gore would tamper with their recreation.

Such fears did not hamper Bob Wise, a nine-term Democratic congressman who defeated Gov. Cecil Underwood. Mr. Underwood, who served as West Virginia's governor from 1956 to 1960, was called out of retirement in 1996 to triumph over a divided Democratic Party.

He faced an enthusiastic, energetic opponent in Mr. Wise, who criticized Mr. Underwood's leadership, pointing to the state's struggling economy despite national prosperity. Mr. Wise was also helped by support from Senator Robert C. Byrd, a Democrat who easily won re-election.

The Republican effort did pay off in Mr. Wise's former congressional district, the Second, which had been held by Democrats for decades. Jim Humphreys, a Democratic trial lawyer, spent more than $5 million of his own money, yet lost to Shelly Moore Capito, a state legislator and the daughter of former Gov. Arch A. Moore Jr.